Can You Give Me A Hand?

You have to hand it to “hand”: It’s a handy word — it handles multiple tasks, both literal and figurative.

“She has firsthand experience with that.”

“We’ve experienced that firsthand.”

Perhaps you are raling about a card game, for example — “I won the first hand and lost all the rest” — or a clock part — “The second hand isn’t moving”. By the way - have you ever noticed that the third hand on a clock or watch is the second hand?

A handyman usually uses tools to get the job done. The word “hand” is handy with tools, too — prepositions, for example.

Baseball pitchers throw “overhand” or, interestingly, “sidearm.” Softball pitchers throw “underhand.” But either kind of pitcher — or anyone else, for that matter — can be “underhanded” — “secret, sly, deceitful, etc.”

Baseball and softball players can be “right-handed” or “left-handed.” They actually use both hands, but these terms indicate which hand they throw with. Batters are left-handed or right-handed, too, except for “switch-hitters,” who can hit either way. In rare instances, batters can be “cross-handed” — usually when starting to learn the game.

Seemingly reflecting a cultural prejudice against left-handers that’s worth further examination (eventually), the adjective “right-hand” also can mean “most helpful or reliable,” as in, “He’s my right-hand man.”

But whether you’re “right-handed” or “left-handed,” you’re using the right hand for you.

“Backhand” and “forehand” are the two basic strokes in tennis. “Backhand” is also a way to catch a baseball, and it’s the term for handwriting “that slants backward, up to the left.”

And “backhanded” also means “expressing or expressed in an indirect or sarcastic way; not sincere; equivocal,” as in “a backhanded compliment.”

Less common is “forehanded,” which has two principal uses other than as a synonym for “forehand”:

“Looking ahead to, or making provision for, the future; thrifty; prudent” and “well-to-do; well-off; prosperous.”

In “forehanded,” thriftiness and prosperity go hand in hand.

Appropriately enough, things got out of hand for a while there, but I’m ready to return to the task at hand.

“Handwriting” generally refers to “longhand,” whereas “shorthand” is “any system of speed writing using quickly made symbols to represent letters, words and phrases.”

But to be “shorthanded” is to be light on workers or helpers needed for a particular chore.

And that’s not the same as “light-handed,” which means either “having a light, delicate touch” or “having little to carry.”

On the other hand, “heavy-handed” not only means not having a light touch; it’s also “clumsy or tactless” or, even heavier, “cruel, oppressive or tyrannical.”

In the former sense — “graceless, inept” — “heavy-handed” sounds a lot like “ham-handed.” Apparently, “ham-handed” originally referred to unusually large hands, resembling hams.

The British prefer to call it “ham-fisted.”

A person having a problem says to another person, “Hey, can you give me a hand?” And instead of offering to help, the other person applauds.

To avoid this misunderstanding, try asking, “Can you lend me a hand?” Either is idiomatically OK, but the latter has a more limited application. Plus there’s the added benefit of indicating temporary assistance (lending) rather than permanent (giving).

In either case, of course, no actual hand will change hands. That’s the charm of idiom: It’s not literal, it’s figurative.

Fortunately, most people in the above situation are willing to lend a hand. But there are some who won’t lift a hand or even lift a finger — except maybe the middle finger.

The adjective “handy” has four principal meanings: “easily reached,” “easily used,” “easily managed or handled” (in reference to a ship, for example) and “clever with the hands.” For a synonym, Webster’s offers “dexterous.”

“Dexterous” and the noun “dexterity” can be applied not only to hands but also the whole body and even the mind. The words are descended from the Latin “dexter,” meaning “right, to the right.”

Interestingly, the Latin word for the other side or direction, “left-hand,” is “sinister.” Nowadays, “sinister” is the “bad side.” It can mean “threatening harm, evil or misfortune,” “wicked, evil or dishonest, especially in some dark, mysterious way” and “disastrous.”

However, the left side was originally the good side. Here’s what happened, according to Webster’s:

Early Roman fortunetellers would face south, putting the lucky side (east) to the left. Then the Greeks came along, and their prophets faced north, putting the lucky side on the right. The later Romans adopted the Greek point of view.

With apologies to Einstein, this is a very special theory of relativity.

Envelop The Envelope

I wondered about the spelling of a word recently. Here is the answer I found.

The phrase “push the envelope” means to exceed, or try to exceed, established boundaries, limits, rules, etc.

The “envelope” is spelled and pronounced the same as that thing a letter arrives in.

However, if you omit the last “e,” you change the pronunciation and the word becomes a verb instead of a noun.

To “envelop” is to “wrap up,” “surround” or “conceal.”

There’s no such thing as “push the envelop.” That’s pushing too far.

The phrase was popularized by Tom Wolfe’s “The Right Stuff,” published in 1979. Before that it was rarely encountered outside aviation circles, where the “flight envelope” referred to capabilities and limits of aircraft. The job of test pilots was to push the envelope, sometimes was disastrous results.

A similar use of “envelope” also can be found in mathematics, but I stink at math, so we’ll leave it at that. I was an English major. I let others do the math.

All Is Well

Back in January I promised Judy that I would blog about “good” and “well.” Well. here it is.

As for her specific example of “you done good,” I have been known to say that myself, but only for comic effect — because it’s dreadfully wrong. (If you hope to be funny when saying things like that, be sure of your audience.)

However, if you use the right verb tense, it can be correct to say “you did good,” if the praise is for a deed that benefits others. This is where the informal “do-gooder” comes from.

“You did well” means something else: The praise is then directed at the performance, not a result of it.

Our grandsons do well in school. As Boy Scouts, they also get to do good.

Most problems with “good” (an adjective) and “well” (usually an adverb) arise with the use of “linking verbs” (also called “copulative”), principally “be,” “become,” “appear,” “seem,” “feel,” “sound,” “taste,” and sometimes “get” and “grow.”

The usual examples involve “feel”:

“I feel good” and “I feel bad” can be comments on my mood or my health.

By contrast, some argue, “feel badly” and “feel well” refer to the sense of touch, although such usage would have to be rare.

Actually, using “feel well” in reference to a person’s health is acceptable idiom.

I like to think of “feeling good” as a state of mind and “feeling well” as a state of health.

I would stay away from “feel badly” altogether.

A word of caution: just memorizing a list of linking verbs can still get you into trouble, because some them also can act as “action verbs.”

For example, “feel strong” refers to physical condition, while “feel strongly” is about emotions.

I hope this helps you feel better about “good” and “well.” If so, all’s well that ends well — unless it’s good.

Oh! The Irony!

Man irons on the M1

Extreme ironing fan makes the most of motorway closure.

* Monday 18 April 2011


The M1 being closed due to fire damage was inconvenient for many people, but for one fan of extreme ironing, it was clearly the perfect opportunity to indulge in his unusual hobby.

The video shows a man taking to the motorway to iron his shirt, bare-legged and wearing a dressing gown.

Extreme Irony


Extreme ironing was invented in the UK, and is described as 'the latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well-pressed shirt'.

A seven-mile section of M1 has been closed since Friday after a blaze in North London. We can't help but think the ironing would've been even more extreme had it been open.

From "The Telegraph"...

1:12PM BST 18 Apr 2011

The extreme ironing stunt, which involves pressing clothing for fun in adventurous places, took place on the M1 motorway after a section was closed following a fire.

The mystery man, who was wearing a blue dressing gown and slippers, was captured on film by a news cameraman.

According to the activity's official website, extreme ironing is "the latest danger sport that combines the thrills of an extreme outdoor activity with the satisfaction of a well-pressed shirt."

The trend is believed to have started in Leicester in 1997 when rock climber Phil Shaw decided to mix his hobby with the mundane chore.

Re-ally. Really?

Really?

Have you ever noticed that a trend in English is the loss of hyphens when forming words with prefixes. It wasn’t too long ago, for example, that words like “today” and “tomorrow” were written “to-day” and “to-morrow.” I can remember doing that in grammar school.

I got thinking the other day about "re-" words. I was very surprised to see how, sometimes, a hyphen alters the meaning. For instance, the verb “resign” means “to quit,” but “re-sign” means “to sign again.” That All-Star pitcher who “resigns” is off the team, but if he “re-signs” he is back on the team.

Webster’s notes a number of these pairs, although some of them can be a bit of a stretch. Among the better ones are:

“re-coil,” to coil anew; “recoil,” to pull or kick back (recoil in horror, the recoil of a rifle).

“re-cover,” to put a new cover on: “recover,” to regain possession of or get better.

“re-collect,” to gather together again; “recollect,” to remember,

“re-creation,” a new version; “recreation,” play, amusement, relaxation.

“re-dress,” to put clothes on again; “redress,” to make right.

“re-form,” to form again; “reform,” to make better.

“re-pose,” to watch the birdie again or rephrase a question; “repose,” to lie at rest.

“re-strain,” to put back through a strainer or pull a muscle again; “restrain,” to check, suppress, restrict.

And I'll close with an example of really pushing it a bit:

“re-ally,” to re-form an alliance; “really” — yes, really.

Say Cheese!

Have you ever had your picture taken?

Then you may have heard, "Say cheese!"

Why?

Well, I wondered that too. This is what I found.

Say cheese

Meaning

A photographer's instruction just before taking a picture, in order to make people smile.

Origin

'Say cheese!' must have been said to people posing for photographs as often as 'watch the birdie!'. Articulating a long 'e' sound requires us to draw back our lips and bare our teeth in a grimace, which is the obvious reason for photographers using it. The question is though - why cheese and not some other word? (and, come to that, why birdie? - but more on that later).

Despite exhaustive etymological delving, no one has found any literal link between 'say cheese' and meaning of the word cheese. Some have suggested that it relates to the now rather archaic term 'cheese it', meaning 'run away'. That's pure speculation and in any case; why would a photographer just about to take someone's picture encourage them to run away? However, looking up this phrase did uncover a nice punning definition of 'cheese it' in the Indiana Weekly Messenger, October 1910:

"What do boys mean when they say 'cheese it?'"

"It means that something mischievous has a curd and they want to get a whey."

Nor is 'say cheese' anything to do with the American expression 'cutting the cheese' about which, if you haven't come across it before, I'll happily leave you in ignorance.

We may not know why 'cheese' was chosen over alternatives like 'breeze' or 'please', but I can give a pointer to who first used the word when having a photograph taken. The earliest printed records of the expression are from the 1940s, in particular, this piece from the Texas newspaper The Big Spring Daily Herald, October 1943, titled Need To Put On A Smile?

Here's How: Say 'Cheese':

Now here's something worth knowing. It's a formula for smiling when you have your picture taken. It comes from former Ambassador Joseph E. Davies and is guaranteed to make you look pleasant no matter what you're thinking. Mr. Davies disclosed the formula while having his own picture taken on the set of his "Mission to Moscow." It's simple. Just say "Cheese," It's an automatic smile. "I learned that from a politician," Mr. Davies chuckled. "An astute politician, a very great politician. But, of course, I cannot tell you who he was..."
Ambassador Davies looked every inch the politician who took his own advice. His coy 'I cannot tell you who it was' was no doubt delivered with a wink, as Davies served under President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who fits his description perfectly well, as listeners in 1940s America would have been well aware.

The fact that the newspaper report presented Davies' recipe as a novelty that its readers would previously be unfamiliar with does suggest that the phrase can't be much earlier than 1943 in origin. It's also reasonable to speculate that Roosevelt was the original source.

Photographers these days often prefer to use 'Say, one, two, three', as it produces the same grins and makes sure that all the sitters smile at the same time. While it appears that virtually any 'long e' word could have been chosen instead, 'cheese' has stood the test of time and has resulted in a new adjective - 'cheesy'. People began to speak of 'cheesy grins' or 'cheesy smiles', as demonstrated by Ambassador Davies, in the 1960s. The word 'cheesy', meaning 'vulgar'/'tasteless', derives from the perceived insincerity of cheesy grins.

As for 'watch the birdie', this now outdated instruction, usually given to children to get them to face in the right direction for a photographic portrait, unlike 'say cheese', did refer to an actual object. The 'birdies' were animated props that could be made to squawk or warble and so attract a child's attention.

Gad Seuss!

From reports by Kristina Lee FOX 5 San Diego and NPR

3:45 p.m. EDT, April 7, 2011


SAN DIEGO -- A book containing previously unpublished stories by the whimsical San Diego author known as Dr. Seuss will be on store shelves later this year.

"The Bippolo Seed and other Lost Stories" contains seven new stories written by Theodor Seuss Geisel.

"In these stories, we'll meet new characters. So you're going to meet the twins Todd and Tadd, you'll meet Gustav the Goldfish and a small boy name Henry McBride, as well as the other characters Dr. Seuss is known for," said Susan Brandt, president of Dr. Seuss Enterprises in La Jolla.

The stories were discovered in old magazine pages offered for sale by a Massachusetts dentist and collector of the beloved children's author's work, NPR reports. A Random House exec traveled to his home, signed him up to write a book about Seuss, and jumped at the chance to publish the lost stories he had compiled.

Before Dr. Seuss became Dr. Seuss, He made a living in advertising. On the side, he wrote for Redbook Magazine where his first story was published in 1950.

"This is exciting for those of who grew up reading Dr. Seuss," Brandt said. "But also, how neat to share with our children new stories that we can discover the together."

While he was alive, Geisel published 44 books, including Green Eggs and Ham" and the "Cat in the Hat." The new book is due out Sept. 27, nearly 20 years after the author died.

"The stories will resonate with Seuss Fans because the personalities of these characters are very similar and recognizable," said Brandt. "In one of the stories we see a precursor to the 'Cat in the Hat Comes Back,' where that ring is in the bathtub."

Brandt said the author's widow, San Diego philanthropist Audrey Geisel, is excited about the new book and the renewed attention it is bringing to Dr. Seuss.

Random House plans to publish The Bippolo Seed and other Lost Stories. An exec describes it as "the literary equivalent of buried treasure," dating from the doc's most fertile creative period, when he wrote The Cat In the Hat, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, and other favorites. "The stories are as good as anything in the already-published canon and readers of all ages are in for a treat," she says.

The Bippolo Seed is lined up for publication in September. "These stories were published during what could arguably be called Dr Seuss's most fertile creative period, a time that would yield both Cat in the Hat and Grinch, a time when his theories about how to reach children through rhyme, rhythm, and a resonant combination of nonsense and sagacity, were coming into full bloom," said Random House vice-president and publisher Kate Klimo. "The stories are as good as anything in the already-published canon and readers of all ages are in for a treat."

The new book includes stories like "Gustav the Goldfish, an early, rhymed version of A Fish Out of Water and The Strange Shirt Spot, which is similar to the bathtub-ring scene in The Cat in the Hat Comes Back. The title story features a cat who leads an innocent duck to make a bad decision."

The Best I Could Find

Over the past week I have looked for news articles on April Fools pranks and jokes that were done this year. I was looking for the best one and here is my choice. It comes from Evanston, Illinois.


I found this great article in the Evanston RoundTable.

Great job Dirk!


April 04, 2011

3/29/2011 2:44:00 PM


Snow Removal Stickers Drifting into Town

By Dirk Cumulo


Grappling with an ominous budget crisis and a colossal snow removal bill following the early February blizzard, Evanston City Council approved a controversial new program that will require residents who wish to have snow removed from in front of their homes to purchase "Snow Removal Stickers." The program, modeled on the highly successful yard waste sticker program that came in roughly $1 million over budget last year, will go into effect when the first snows fall in late autumn or early winter 2011.

Council passed the measure during a contentious April 1 special City Council meeting on the budget. Concerns about budget shortfall dominated, causing newly appointed Snow Czar Pearl de Blanc to say, "This is an opportunity for the City to monetize a critical citizen safety service. With this program, we can climb ever closer to solvency."

Under the program as currently structured, citizens will rent orange traffic cones from the City and affix daily snow removal stickers to those cones by 6:45 a.m. the morning before, during or after a snowfall. Stickers will be $2.25 per day. City snow plows will then remove snow from in front of any address displaying a sticker. "Our plows can raise or lower blades easily, allowing us to skip homes without stickers," said Ms. de Blanc. "We can even narrow the blade to get only one side of the street."

Citizens may purchase, at an additional $2 fee, a driveway clearance sticker which will direct snow plows to avoid piling snow in front of a citizen’s driveway while clearing the rest of the street. "We are offering a wide range of snow removal services. Citizens are afforded the opportunity of selecting the service that best fits within their budget," said Ms. De Blanc.

Concerns over particularly heavy snowfall prompted an additional option crafted during Monday’s meeting. Alfred Montoya, during citizen comment, said, "What of this last blizzard? Two feet of snow will completely cover a 22-inch orange safety cone." Ms. De Blanc appeared not to have considered this possibility, but then inspiration struck.

"The City will also offer mylar balloons that can be affixed to the cones. Stickers can be displayed on the balloon surface, and an adjustable cord will allow citizens to change the height of the display," announced Ms. De Blanc. The balloons can be purchased with stickers already attached, she added, increasing the price of the sticker by a mere $1.75.

Asked about neighbor-to-neighbor squabbles that could result if everyone on a street purchased a sticker except one holdout on the corner, Ms. De Blanc asked for and received guidance from Council. Proposals included a possible "street sticker," a program under which an entire block could band together and insure that the whole street was plowed. The convenience afforded would of course allow the City to command a slightly higher fee than individual stickers. "We learned our lesson from the yard waste sticker vs. cart process," she said.

Council also recommended a campaign within elementary schools to design the stickers themselves. "This is another opportunity to bring the community together through citizen involvement as we are raising all important funds," said Ms. de Blanc. The campaign begins immediately – April 1, 2011.

EDITOR'S NOTE POSTED 3/31/11: THIS IS AN APRIL'S FOOLS STORY

Where Does Your Team Play?

It used to be that sports venues had interesting and picturesque names. There is Yankee Stadium - The House that Ruth Built in New York, The Indianapolis Motor Speedway or The Brickyard, Wrigley Field known as The Friendly Confines to all baseball fans, Madison Square Garden is, of course, The World's Most Famous Arena in New York for basketball fans and, across the pond there is Old Trafford - The Theatre of Dreams.

But most new venues may look wonderful and interesting, their names leave a lot to be desired. Consider -

Progressive Field (formerly Jacobs Field) known as The Jake in Cleveland

Qualcomm Stadium - The Q in San Diego

Tropicana Field - The Trop in St. Petersburg

Safeco Field - The Safe in Seattle

and

Turner Field - The Ted in Atlanta.

How exciting! What mental images do those words bring to mind?

Even here in CT we have Rentschler Field where the UConn Huskies play football. It is now more commonly known as The Rent. That sure gives a whole new meaning to "paying the rent"!

I look forward to the day when a schiitake mushroom conglomerate takes ownership of a beautiful sports venue.


"Welcome fans! Today's game from the ..." well, you can figure it out. As my wife said when she read this, "No, no not The Mush and not The Shroom! Hey! I know my... well ,you know.

YGBKM!*

OMG! Online abbreviations make Oxford dictionary


Mar 25, 2:48 PM (ET)

By JILL LAWLESS

LONDON (AP) - OMG! LOL! The venerable Oxford English Dictionary approves of the three-letter, Internet-inspired expressions you use for "Oh, my God!" and "Laughing out loud."

It is adding them to the authoritative reference book's latest online update.

You can now text the news to your BFF. That's "best friends forever."

All three expressions - and IMHO, or "in my humble opinion" - are among 900 new words included this week. Cracking the dictionary, however, is no easy task.

"The OED is quite cautious," said Graeme Diamond, OED's principal editor for new words.

Terms made popular online are only included among the dictionary's 300,000 entries when they have crossed over into everyday use, Diamond said.

Although the new abbreviations are associated with modern electronic communications, some are surprisingly old. The first confirmed use of OMG was in a 1917 letter by a British admiral.

"Things people think are new words normally have a longer history," Diamond said.

Editors publish updates to the online Oxford every three months.

The OED's Internet version was launched in 2000 and gets 2 million hits a month from subscribers. It may replace the mammoth 20-volume printed edition, last published in 1989.

The new update also includes:

- "muffin top,""a protuberance of flesh above the waistband of a tight pair of trousers."

- wag, "wives and girlfriends." It was first used in 2002 to describe the female partners of members of the England soccer team. Now it denotes the glamorous and extravagant female partners of male celebrities.

"By our standards, wag is a real rocket of a word," Diamond said. "To go from being coined in 2002 to being included in 2011 is quite unusual."

- "heart" as a verb, a casual equivalent of "to love" that is represented with a symbol, as seen on millions of souvenirs proclaiming "I (heart) New York."

It may be the first English usage to come from T-shirts and bumper stickers. "At some point, people started to vocalize what the symbol was rather than what the symbol stood for," said Fiona McPherson, another editor. "People now talk about hearting things left, right and center."

Well, the latest update hearts the Road Runner cartoon character. The word "meep" - a short high-pitched sound - made the cut.

There are other new terms from the online world, including ego-surfing (the practice of searching for your own name on the Internet) and dot-bomb (a failed Internet company).

Diamond said the Internet has revolutionized the way lexicographers work, giving them a huge amount of new evidence of word use.

Which brings us to another new online-inspired word: TMI, "too much information."

#####


* = You Gotta Be Kidding Me! Although many users substitute an S for the K...


Gotta run! Meep, meep..................zoom!

---

The Diagram Prize?

Genghis Khan Dentists Beat Welders, Dog Trainer in Odd Title Book Contest


By James Pressley - Mar 24, 2011 8:00 PM ET





Genghis Khan-inspired dentists overcame welders, a Hollywood dog trainer and an Italian love child to win one of Britain’s quirkiest literary contests, the annual Diagram Prize for Oddest Book Title.

“Managing a Dental Practice: The Genghis Khan Way” received 58 percent of 5,032 votes cast by the public, according to the Bookseller trade magazine, which runs the contest.

The runner-up, with 24 percent, was “8th International Friction Stir Welding Symposium Proceedings,” a collection of papers presented at a gathering in Germany. The other four finalists garnered just 8 percent to 3 percent of the vote each, Bookseller editors said in an e-mailed statement.

The winning title comes from a how-to guide on “survival and empire-building in the dentistry business,” as its publisher, Radcliffe, calls it. The author, former dentist and practice owner Michael R. Young, describes the Mongol conqueror as “one of history’s most charismatic and dynamic leaders,” arguing that dentists can learn from his tenacity, intelligence gathering, and willingness to adopt new technologies.

The award’s administrator, Philip Stone, called the book timely, given Prime Minister David Cameron’s plans to restructure the U.K.’s state-run National Health Service.

“Some practice owners may well have to adopt a more warlord-ish approach to oral health care in order to survive,” Stone said in the statement.

Other finalists included “What Color Is Your Dog?” by Hollywood dog trainer Joel Silverman, with 8 percent of the vote, and romance novel “The Italian’s One-Night Love-Child” with 4 percent. “Myth of the Social Volcano,” a book on inequality in China, and “The Generosity of the Dead,” a study on organ procurement, got 3 percent each.
Claret Bottle

The contending titles were nominated by publishers, booksellers, authors, agents and librarians. This year’s winner was spotted by former biochemist and science writer Michael Gross, who will receive a bottle of “fairly passable” claret.

First awarded in 1978, the contest was conceived as a way to avoid boredom at the Frankfurt Book Fair, Bookseller editors say. The inaugural prize in 1978 went to “Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Nude Mice.”

Since 2000, the prize has been put to a public vote, allowing “the unwashed masses to decide,” as a past Bookseller release put it. Since then, winning titles have included “Living With Crazy Buttocks” and “If You Want Closure in Your Relationship, Start With Your Legs.”

Eccentricity overcame vulgarity over the past two years, as the prize went to “Crocheting Adventures With Hyperbolic Planes” and “The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-Milligram Containers of Fromage Frais.”

The prize has become an institution, generating two bound collections of winning jackets, including “How to Avoid Huge Ships: And Other Implausibly Titled Books.”

Rules Grammar Change

From The Onion


WASHINGTON, DC—The U.S. Grammar Guild Monday announced that no more will traditional grammar rules English follow. Instead there will a new form of organizing sentences be.

U.S. Grammar Guild according to, the new structure loosely on an obscure 800-year-old, pre-medieval Anglo-Saxon syntax is based. The syntax primarily verbs, verb clauses and adjectives at the end of sentences placing involves. Results this often, to ears American, a sentence backward appearing.

"Operating under we are, one major rule," said Joyce Watters, president of the U.S. Grammar Guild. "Make English, want we, more archaic and dignified sounding to be, as if every word coming from the tongue of a centuries-old, mystical wizard, is."

Brief pause Watters made then a. "Know I, know I," said she. "Confusing sounds it, but every American used to it soon will be."

At a press conference recent greeted warmly the new measure by President Clinton was.

"No longer will we adhere to the dull, predictable structure of our traditional grammar system. This nation will now begin speaking, writing and listening to something fresh, exciting and different," said Clinton.

"Excuse me," added he pause long after a. "Meant I, the dull, predictable system our traditional grammar of adhere to no longer will we. Speaking, writing and listening to something fresh, exciting and different will this nation now begin."

This week beginning, America across, all dictionaries, thesauruses and any other books or objects with any sort of writing upon it or in it revised to fit the new syntax will be. Libraries assure people wish to that the transition promptly begin will, but that patient people should be, as so much to change there is.

"Feel good it will make people to know for all these changes that, librarians cold, crabby and as paranoid and overprotective of their books and periodicals as ever remain will," said Yvonne Richter, Director of the Library of Congress.

The enthusiasm of government officials despite, many Americans about the new plan upset are. "Why in the world did they do this?" a New Canaan, CT, insurance salesman, said Brent Pryce. "There's absolutely no reason. It's utterly pointless and will cause total chaos throughout the country, not to mention the fact that it will cost billions of dollars to implement. And what's this U.S. Grammar Guild, anyway? I've never heard of it."

When of this complaint informed, government officials that they could not the man's words understand said, because of the strange, unintelligible way of speaking he was.

10 Loanwords To Enjoy

A loanword is a word borrowed directly from another language to express something which has no accuarate word in English. This is a list of the ten most common loanwords.

10. Ennui

From French. Boredom of the soul.

9. Schadenfreude

From German. Taking joy in the suffering of others.

8. Wanderlust

From German. A strong longing or desire towards wandering.

7. Sehnsucht

From German. A self-destructive or addictive yearning for a time, place or thing that one can’t explain.

6. Saudade

From Portuguese. A feeling of longing for something that one is fond of, which is gone, but might return in a distant future, although deep down you know it probably wont.


5. Doppelganger

From German. The ghostly double of a living person.

4. Weltschmerz

From German. The pathological suffering felt by one who has realised that physical reality can never truly satisfy the demands of the mind. A melancholy sense of anguish about the nature of being.

3. Zeitgeist

From German. Something that captures the spirit of the era.

2. Ad Hominem Pronunciation: add om-in-im

Argument

From Latin. Replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking the person who made it, and not what he said.

1. Déjà vu

From French. The sense of having already seen or hear something being experienced for the first time.

Do You Hate Any Word?

Jonathan Swift hated the word bowels. Gloria Swanson, the faded silent movie star in Sunset Boulevard, hated the word glamor, while the character she played, Norma Desmond, hated comeback. Chicago newspaper columnist Mike Royko hated the word relationship ("the kind of sterile word used by lawyers and sociologists and other menaces"). Carson McCullers hated the words prose and poetry, though she wrote both.

British novelist V.S. Naipaul hates the word novel, documentary filmmaker Irving Saraf hates documentary, and news anchor Katie Couric hates the word panties ("a cheesy word for underpants"). Of course, many of us claim to hate the word hate.

People have various reasons for disliking (or downright loathing) certain words. It may be a buzzword that has worn out its welcome (such as paradigm or proactive). Or an overly familiar redundancy (added bonus, future plans), mispronunciation ("nuc-u-lar" for nuclear), or usage error ("between you and I").

Some of us have "zero tolerance" for elision (definally for definitely), malapropisms (mitigate for militate), blends (bromance), or verbing (to effort or incent). All of us have words that make us want to bang our heads on the desk.

I decided to collect my verbal peeves for a couple of months. These come from many sources - newspapers, web pages, sports broadcasts and even weather reports on the radio. There are many, many more where these came from!

Awesome, isn't it?



actual

agree to disagree

Aim high.

a.m. in the morning

And you are?

anomalous

anywho

Are you serious?

ASAP

as everyone knows

at the end of the day (It gets DARK!)

axe (instead of "ask")

back at you

basic fundamentals

beside her/himself

big society

body of work (as used by sportscasters)

bored of (instead of "bored with")

buy-in (management-speak for "agree")

card (used as a verb)

chillax

co-branded

cold slaw (instead of "cole slaw")

come on board (instead of "join")

completely forget

continue on (instead of simply "continue")

conversate (instead of "converse")

de-thaw

dialogue (used as a verb)

die for (as in "a dessert to die for")

Do the math! (I was an English major - YOU do the math!)

drug (instead of "dragged")

empower and empowered

epicenter (misused as a synonym for "center")

even (as in "I don't even know what to think")

exscape (instead of "escape")

face time

for all intensive purposes (instead of "for all intents and purposes")

free gift

FYI

ghetto (used as an adjective)

ginormous

gots (as in "I gots no)

ground-breaking

grow (as a transitive verb for anything in the business or financial world, as in "grow our audience")

have a dialogue

I heart (anything)

I said to her I said

I thought to myself

ice tea (instead of "iced tea")

iconic

if I would have (instead of "if I had")

if you will

illegal alien (instead of "illegal immigrant")

I'm good

in actual fact

in a sec

invite (as a noun instead of "invitation")

It goes without saying.

It's all good.

just so you know

kumbayah moment

last (instead of "most recent")

long story short

of a certain age

partner (as a verb)

personally (as in, "I personally . . .")

price point (instead of "price")

refudiate

seriously

should of and would of (instead of "should have" and "would have")

Shut up! (in response to an interesting bit of information)

small little

solution (in a business context)

so over it

speak to (an issue)

teachable moment

that being said

there you go (instead of "thank you")

the thing is is

throw (somebody) under the bus

a time when and a time where

try and (instead of "try to")

undoubtably (instead of "undoubtedly")

up (used as a verb, as in "You should up your efforts.")

veggies

verse (instead of versus)

vice a versa (instead of "vice versa")

wanna (instead of "want to")

wax paper (instead of "waxed paper")

way more (and any other use of "way" as an adverb)

We're done here.

Where are you at?

whether or not

white stuff (instead of "snow")

whole 'nuther

win-win for everyone

with regard to and with respect to (instead of "about")

with that being said

xerox (instead of "copy" or "photocopy")

You can't be serious!

you guys

A Post From "The Economist"

The Economist is a great blog. In this blog, named after the dictionary-maker Samuel Johnson, correspondents write about the effects that the use (and sometimes abuse) of language have on politics, society and culture around the world.

Recently, this item was posted. Do you care?


"On Language" switched off

Mar 1st 2011, 19:17 by R.L.G. | NEW YORK

FOR several decades the New York Times Magazine hosted America's most prominent bit of linguistic punditry: the "On Language" column, written by William Safire for most of those years. When Safire died several years ago, the column was taken up by Ben Zimmer, who took on the serious and the silly in language with wit and verve undergirded by a vast amount of knowledge. This blog has often found reason to rely on him. Now the column is no more; the magazine's new editor axed it, along with several other features. Every new editor has the right to a shake-up, but with no disrespect to those others, though, "On Language" was a long-lived and beloved institution, the only place in American journalism where language was given such prominence. Cutting it was a mistake.

Irate readers have started a Facebook page, and even as I was composing this post ("3 minutes ago", says Facebook), word from the group is that Hugo Lindgren, the magazine's new editor, might be wavering, saying that the column is "on hiatus", not dead. If you're going to miss the column, "like" the Facebook page or write to the magazine: magazine@nytimes.com.

Taking A Look At Paradox

A paradox is a figure of speech in which a statement appears to contradict itself.

Adjective: paradoxical.

Etymology:

From the Greek, "incredible, contrary to opinion or expectation"

Examples and Observations:

* "The swiftest traveler is he that goes afoot."

(Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854)


* "If you wish to preserve your secret, wrap it up in frankness."

(Alexander Smith, "On the Writing of Essays." Dreamthorp, 1854)


* "I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love."

(Anon)


* "War is peace."
"Freedom is slavery."
"Ignorance is strength."

(George Orwell, 1984)


* The Paradox of Catch-22 (My personal favorite!)

"There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that concern for one's own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to."

(Joseph Heller, Catch-22, 1961)


* "Perhaps this is our strange and haunting paradox here in America--that we are fixed and certain only when we are in movement."

(Thomas Wolfe, You Can't Go Home Again, 1940)


* "Yes, I must confess. I often find myself more at home in these ancient volumes than I do in the hustle-bustle of the modern world. To me, paradoxically, the literature of the so-called 'dead tongues' holds more currency than this morning's newspaper. In these books, in these volumes, there is the accumulated wisdom of mankind, which succors me when the day is hard and the night lonely and long."

(Tom Hanks as Professor G.H. Dorr in The Ladykillers, 2004)


* Kahlil Gibran's Paradoxes

"At times [in The Prophet by Khalil Gibran], Almustafa’s vagueness is such that you can’t figure out what he means. If you look closely, though, you will see that much of the time he is saying something specific; namely, that everything is everything else. Freedom is slavery; waking is dreaming; belief is doubt; joy is pain; death is life. So, whatever you’re doing, you needn’t worry, because you’re also doing the opposite. Such paradoxes . . . now became his favorite literary device. They appeal not only by their seeming correction of conventional wisdom but also by their hypnotic power, their negation of rational processes."

(Joan Acocella, "Prophet Motive." The New Yorker, Jan. 7, 2008)


* "Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again."

(C.S. Lewis to his godchild, Lucy Barfield, to whom he dedicated The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe)


* Love's Paradox

"You will notice that what we are aiming at when we fall in love is a very strange paradox. The paradox consists of the fact that, when we fall in love, we are seeking to re-find all or some of the people to whom we were attached as children. On the other hand, we ask our beloved to correct all of the wrongs that these early parents or siblings inflicted upon us. So that love contains in it the contradiction: the attempt to return to the past and the attempt to undo the past."

(Martin Bergmann as Professor Levy in Crimes and Misdemeanors, 1989)

Did You Remember?

Yesterday Was National Grammar Day

Did you march forth?


Me, Myself, and I


A recent story on the local news show ended with the interviewee saying, "It was good for the neighborhood and myself."

I was glad that things had worked out for the community, but, being as concerned as I am with grammar, I couldn’t help thinking, Why is that grammar error becoming more common?

The error of which I speak, of course, is the incorrect use of the pronoun myself. The –self pronouns are called either reflexive or intensive depending on their function in a sentence. What’s important here, though, is that in either case, myself shouldn’t be used unless there’s an I previously in the same sentence.

* I prepared it myself.
* I saw myself in the mirror.
* I consider myself fortunate.
* I, myself, haven’t had that problem, but I know someone who has.
* They asked whether I, myself, had ever encountered that particular problem.

Don’t use –self pronouns when a nominative or objective pronoun is in order.

* It was good for the neighborhood and me (not myself).
* He gave the book to him and me (not myself).
* She and I (not myself) are going to the opera.

It might be easier to determine the correct pronoun if you separate each pronoun into its own sentence. For example:

* He gave the book to him. He gave the book to (I, me, or myself). It’s clear that the correct pronoun is me, so the sentence is He gave the book to him and me.

* She is going to the opera. (I, me, myself) am going to the opera. The correct pronoun is, of course, I, so the correct sentence is She and I are going to the opera.

It’s interesting to note that there have been reputable writers who have used the reflexive pronouns incorrectly (as is true with all grammar errors), so if you, yourself, are an offender, you’re in good company.

*****

I also found the following on The Economist -

Language
Johnson
National Grammar Day
What is grammar anyway?

Mar 4th 2011, 18:12 by J.P.

GRAMMAR is a strange and wonderful thing. It is also fuzzy. At least the word "grammar" is. So fuzzy, in fact, that linguists rarely invoke it, other than in the broad meaning of "language". They tend instead to plump for the narrower terms. And so morphology deals with the bits of words, like affixes and roots, that contribute to meaning; syntax looks at how morphemes are arranged in utterances; semantics hones in on meaning, be it of single words or more elaborate linguistic constructs; finally, pragmatics tries to understand how context in which words appear affects their interpretation. (Some linguists—a notoriously fractious bunch—will no doubt take exception to this taxonomy.)

So, is there anything sensible to be said about grammar? Theorists' finicky distinctions aside, few would object that it is a set of rules that govern the way bits of speech come together to become meaningful utterances. That, of course, raises the question of who sets these rules. Here the bickering begins. Some institutions, notably the French Academy, seem to think they do. Then there are the linguists. Mercifully, they rarely claim to be rule setters. But they do often give the impression of believing that they know them better than "ordinary" speakers.

True, language scholars pore over pages of books, peruse transcripts, listen to endless reels of recorded speech. If all goes to plan, they will come up with a set of rules that predicts how non-linguists actually speak. But it is, at best, a belated snapshot. Should enough people run afoul of these theoretical findings, they do not deserve to have their wrists slapped—with a rule or anything else. Rather, it means that the linguists described a grammar as it once was, not as it now is.

Both académiciens and grammarians may, then, have got things the wrong way round. Grammar is subject to majority rule, not autocratic decree. If a speaker does not abide by the same rules as most others, he is, by definition, not speaking the same language. It does not matter one bit that he happens to be a member of an academy or a prominent linguist; minorities are excluded. (More precisely, no two people, let alone all the members of a community, follow the exact same set of grammatical rules; the key is a big enough overlap.)

National Grammar Day can, therefore, be viewed as celebrating consensus and inveighing against tyranny (other than the tyranny of the majority that is language). Now, here is something everyone, not just language buffs, can cheer.

A Sad Day

It was a sad day. My pet bookworm, Tome, has gone to the Great Library In The Sky.

I had given him a new book to get into and digest. He smiled as he sat down at the table of contents and dug in. About 30 minutes later he looked very ill. I called for help and hoped for the best. But it was too late. The doctor removed the appendix but Tome had passed.

I sat down and tried to write his obituary. As I wrote, a drop of ink fell to the paper. Another wave of sadness washed over me. The poor drop sat there, all alone. He looked up and realized that his parents were still in the pen and he had no idea how long the sentence was.

:(

Like Comparing Knight and Day At The Roundtable

I want to share these “funniest analogies” with you. They came in an e-mail from a good friend. She got them from a cousin, who got them from a friend, who got them from… so they are circulating around. My apologies if you have already seen them.

The e-mail says they are taken from actual high school essays and collected by English teachers across the country for their own amusement. Some of these kids may have bright futures as humor writers. What do you think?

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a ThighMaster.

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife’s infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn’t.

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you’re on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan’s teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.

18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long it had rusted shut.

19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with power tools.

25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.


I immediately replied, “Thanks for the list. It made me laugh like someone who had read something really funny.”

Have You Played Scrabble Lately?

I had occasion recently to play a couple of games of Scrabble. Of course, it piqued my interest and I went hunting. Here is some of what I found.

Even though it’s a word game, the real story behind SCRABBLE® Brand Crossword Game is numbers. One hundred million sets sold world-wide. Between one and two million sold each year in North America. And, of keen interest to legions of passionate players, over 120,000 words that may be used in their scoring arsenal.

The story of the game’s evolution from underground craze to cultural icon is as American as, well, the SCRABBLE game. Alfred Mosher Butts, an out-of-work architect from Poughkeepsie, New York, decided to invent a board game. Analyzing games, he found they fell into three categories: number games, such as dice and bingo; move games, such as chess and checkers and word games, such as anagrams. Attempting to create a game that would use both chance and skill, Butts combined features of anagrams and the crossword puzzle. First called LEXIKO, the game was later called CRISS CROSS WORDS. To decide on letter distribution, Butts studied the front page of The New York Times and did painstaking calculations of letter frequency. His basic cryptographic analysis of our language and his original tile distribution have remained valid for almost three generations and billions of games played.

Established game manufacturers were unanimous in rejecting Butts’ invention for commercial development. Then Butts met James Brunot, a game-loving entrepreneur who became enamored of the concept. Together, they made some refinements on rules and design and, most importantly, came up with the name “SCRABBLE,” a real word which means “to grope frantically.” The game was trademarked SCRABBLE® Brand Crossword Game in 1948. The Brunots rented an abandoned schoolhouse in Dodgington, Connecticut, where with friends they turned out 12 games an hour, stamping letters on wooden tiles one at a time. Later, boards, boxes and tiles were made elsewhere and sent to the factory for assembly and shipping.

CRISS CROSS WORDS, an early version of the SCRABBLE game, featured a gameboard made of architectural blueprint paper glued onto an old chess board.

The first four years were a struggle. In 1949 the Brunots made 2,400 sets and lost $450. As so often happens in the game business, the SCRABBLE game gained slow but steady popularity among a comparative handful of consumers. Then in the early 1950s, as legend has it, the president of MACY’S discovered the game on vacation and ordered some for his store. Within a year, everyone “had to have one” to the point that SCRABBLE games were being rationed to stores around the country.

In 1952, the Brunots realized they could no longer make the games fast enough to meet the growing interest. They licensed Long Island-based Selchow & Righter Company, a well-known game manufacturer founded in 1867, to market and distribute the games in the United States and Canada.

Even Selchow & Righter had to step up production to meet the overwhelming demand for the SCRABBLE game. As stories about it appeared in national newspapers, magazines and on television, it seemed that everybody had to have a set immediately. In 1972, Selchow & Righter purchased the trademark from Brunot, thereby giving the company the exclusive rights to all SCRABBLE® Brand products and entertainment services in the United States and Canada.

In 1986, Selchow & Righter was sold to COLECO Industries, who had become famous as the manufacturers of the Cabbage Patch Dolls. Three years later, COLECO declared bankruptcy, and its primary assets — most notably the SCRABBLE game and ParchesiTM — were purchased by Hasbro, Inc., owner of Milton Bradley Company, the nation’s leading game company.

Today the game is found in one of every three American homes, ranging from a Junior edition to a CD-ROM with many versions in between including: Standard, Deluxe with turntable, Deluxe Travel, Spanish and French.

Competitive SCRABBLE game play is widely popular much in the manner of chess and bridge. Every year, a National SCRABBLE® Championship is held in a major US city, and on alternate years the World SCRABBLE® Championship is hosted between Hasbro and Mattel. In addition, the National SCRABBLE® Association sanctions over 180 tournaments and more than 200 clubs in the US and Canada.

The next generation of SCRABBLE players is steadily growing with over a half million kids playing the game in more than 18,000 schools nationwide through the School SCRABBLE Program. Hundreds of these students currently compete in state and regional championships across the country. The first annual National School SCRABBLE® Championship was held in Boston on April 26, 2003. Classrooms can also subscribe to the School SCRABBLE® News which includes a teacher edition complete with tested ideas and a lesson plan designed to meet nationally mandated educational goals, and a student issue chock full of feature stories and puzzles.

Alfred Mosher Butts enjoyed playing the SCRABBLE game with family and friends to the end of his life. He passed away in April 1993 at the age of 93



Strange Words Used in Scrabble Defined

From Qi to Kat, Advanced Scrabble Words Given Meaning


When one first plays scrabble, many of the words a more skilled opponent uses seem questionable. Here are a selection of those words that come into question.

Any scrabble player knows that having a strong vocabulary is essential for victory. But often the words used in game are archaic, or one may encounter words that are rarely, if ever, used in the English language. Words like qi, qat, suq, and xi can be big point-earners on the scrabble board, but use them in a conversation and the response is likely to be a blank stare.

So, for anyone who has ever played a game of scrabble, especially online, and been flummoxed by some of the words used: A list of commonly used scrabble words and their definitions, as defined by dictionary.com.

2 Letter Scrabble Words, Defined

Aa (noun)- “basaltic lava having a rough surface.”

Ai (noun)- “a three-toed sloth, Bradypus tridactylus, inhabiting forests of southern Venezuela, the Guianas, and northern Brazil, having a diet apparently restricted to the leaves of the trumpet-tree, and sounding a high-pitched cry when disturbed.”

Qi(noun)- a derivative of Ch’i, “The vital force believed in Taoism and other Chinese thought to be inherent in all things. The unimpeded circulation of chi and a balance of its negative and positive forms in the body are held to be essential to good health in traditional Chinese medicine.”

Xi (noun)- “the 14th letter of the Greek alphabet.”
3 Letter Scrabble Words, Defined

Suq (noun)- “A market, or part of a market, in an Arab city.”

Kat (noun)- “An evergreen shrub, Catha edulis, of Arabia and Africa, the leaves of which are used as a narcotic when chewed or made into a beverage.”

An alternate spelling of Kat is Qat. Both work.


4 or More Letter Scrabble Words, Defined

Ogive (noun)- “1. Architecture. a. a diagonal vaulting rib. b. a pointed arch. 2. Statistics. the distribution curve of a frequency distribution. 3. Rocketry. the curved nose of a missile or rocket.

Teiid (noun)- “any of a large group of chiefly tropical New World lizards of the family Teiidae, as the racerunner, caiman lizard, or whiptail, characterized by large rectangular scales on the belly and a long tail.”

Maqui (noun)- “an evergreen shrub, Aristotelia chilensis, of Chile, having toothed, oblong leaves, greenish-white flowers, and purple berries, grown as an ornamental in S California.”

Jupon (noun)- “a close-fitting tunic, usually padded and bearing heraldic arms, worn over armor.”

Naos (noun, plural)- “a temple.”

Baobabs (noun)- “any large tree belonging to the genus Adansonia, of the bombax family, esp. A. digitata, which is native to tropical Africa, has an exceedingly thick trunk, and bears a gourdlike fruit.”